Whereas such a transfer would nonetheless qualify as a serious shock and would take a very long time to return to fruition — the membership’s lease with the Truman Sports activities Advanced runs via January 2031 — sharks are smelling blood within the water. As Lukas Weese of The Athletic writes, Dallas mayor Eric Johnson is openly advocating for the Chiefs to maneuver to Dallas.
Within the wake of the voters’ choice on the sales-tax extension, Johnson mentioned on X, “welcome residence Dallas Texans” (previous to transferring to Kansas Metropolis and rebranding because the Chiefs after the 1962 season, the membership started play because the Dallas Texans, a constitution member of the AFL). Whereas that was one thing of a tongue-in-cheek remark, Johnson is critical about the potential of bringing the franchise again to Texas.
“The connections are so deep, the historical past is so wealthy,” Johnson mentioned. “We truly may put collectively the offers that will make sense for them to get them right here.”
Johnson’s enthusiasm apart, even when the Chiefs had been to undertake a relocation effort, there are any variety of hurdles that might thwart a transfer to Dallas. One such hurdle, in fact, is the very fact there may be already a crew in that metropolis, and it’s the Most worthy crew within the league, underneath the stewardship of maybe the NFL’s most influential proprietor.
Regardless of having didn’t advance to the Tremendous Bowl because the finish of the 1995 marketing campaign, Jerry Jones‘ Cowboys stay vastly widespread and had been just lately valued at $9 billion.
Johnson would not sound involved concerning an objection from Jones or in regards to the viability of two NFL franchises in Dallas.
“When the NFL seems to be on the subsequent spherical of enlargement, they won’t discover an American metropolis the place there may be not an NFL franchise at present that will likely be a extra profitable or faster-growing market to place a crew,” he mentioned.
Weese, citing census studies, says that the inhabitants of Dallas-Fort Price has elevated by roughly 23% since 2010, and present estimates counsel that it may very well be the third-largest metro space within the nation — behind solely Los Angeles and New York, each of which have two NFL golf equipment — by the 2030s.
Johnson, who took workplace in 2019, has been searching for one other main sports activities franchise for Dallas for a while, and two years in the past he put collectively an advert hoc committee as a part of that endeavor. So far as the place a hypothetical second NFL crew would play, he has floated Hensley Area, a 738-acre city-owned web site that was as soon as the Dallas Naval Air Station, as a potential residence. The location is on the water and gives the possibility for an more and more widespread mixed-use growth that might characterize “an economically vibrant district of the town that brings new alternatives to its residents and staff.”
The Chiefs, recent off their third Tremendous Bowl title in 5 years, are a bonafide dynasty that also has many extra years of Patrick Mahomes to take pleasure in. It’s far too quickly for his or her native followers to panic, but when Hunt, Donovan & Co. search to maneuver, they are going to discover that one of many nation’s largest cities has its arms vast open.
